Nine stopped broadcasting its signal into regional Western Australia from midnight following stalled negotiations between Nine and regional affiliate broadcasters.
An agreement was unable to be reached between Nine Entertainment Corporation, Prime, and WIN Television.
Nine has issued the following statement about the blackout:
Nine is disappointed that audiences in regional WA will be unable to receive our programming after the licence holders in that region, WIN and Prime, rejected all offers to find a reasonable negotiated agreement despite Nine concluding new program supply agreements for all other regional licence areas across the country.
Viewers can access our content by downloading the 9Now App to watch our programs live or on catch up.
The only beneficiaries of this situation are Prime and WIN, who will now broadcast their signals in Regional WA with no real competition from West Digital Television (their joint venture and the holder of the third commercial television broadcasting licence in Regional WA). This is at odds with the purpose of the licence which West Digital Television has been granted and a terrible disservice to their audience. There will also be less options for advertisers in the region and no ability for local advertisers seeking to reach consumers in Regional WA in association with Nine’s top ratings programs such as The Voice, Love Child, the Today Show and Nine’s nightly news.
Prime released this statement about WA programming negotiations:
Prime Media Group and WIN Corporation have, over the past couple of weeks, worked in good faith with the Nine Entertainment Company to negotiate the terms of a program affiliation agreement for the joint venture, West Digital Television, from 1 July 2016 onwards.
Unfortunately, the parties were not able to reach an agreement by the deadline.
As a result all Nine, GEM and GO programming will cease to be broadcast in regional Western Australia from midnight tonight (WST).